


Love in the Silence

by A_Tired_Writer



Category: The Infernal Devices Series - Cassandra Clare, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Fluff, F/M, Friends to Lovers, I promise it's nothing wilder than what you've read in the shadowhunter chronicles, Kidnapping, Living Together, M/M, Minor Violence, Modern Retelling, Multi, Romance, Roommates, Secret Organizations, Slow Burn, oh my god they were roommates, wow that's a really heavy tag
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-04
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:08:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26277685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Tired_Writer/pseuds/A_Tired_Writer
Summary: Life is good, until it isn't; life is normal, until it isn't; life is safe, until it isn't.For Tessa, life had been good; for Will, life had been normal; for Jem, life had been safe.Ugly souls live in the shadows of their memories, connected in ways they are only beginning to understand. What lies ahead of them is a path of tested trust, adrenaline-laced danger, and the faintest hint of romance when they're not otherwise busy with ensuring the safety of hundreds of thousands of people.If they wish to have a future, they must master their pasts—but with illness and secrets and a world hidden right under their noses, that may prove harder than they had thought.Classes were quickly becoming the least of their problems.
Relationships: Jem Carstairs/Tessa Gray, Jem Carstairs/Tessa Gray/Will Herondale, Jem Carstairs/Will Herondale, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Tessa Gray/Will Herondale
Comments: 25
Kudos: 19





	1. The End of the Start, the Start of the End

**Author's Note:**

> Listen. This kind of gets off-the-rails—but only because I'm trying to create a secret-society equivalent without magic. It'll—you'll see. This really is just a sort of retelling of TID, but with a spin on it. 
> 
> Also: the first chapter is going to be exceptionally short, just to sort of get the ball rolling on the story, and to offer the reader a clearer insight into the sort of story it's going to be.

“James Carstairs, are you leaving me outside like a _pet_ _dog?”_

“Would you rather I leave you outside like an undomesticated jaguar?”

Will huffed, leaning against the damp brick of the shop to his left. “Just go inside and get your shit.”

Jem’s smile was its usual display of kind-hearted cordiality, but for William Herondale, it seemed there would always be the blade-like edge of amusement. “That was the plan.”

Will shook his head disappointedly, showier than he had any right to, and turned so his back was pressed against the front of the bookshop. The sun had fully dipped beneath the horizon now, throwing the rain-soaked streets of London into whorls of black and gold and platinum. The storm—though, really, it was hardly severe enough to qualify as such—had ended an hour before, leaving his and Jem’s path relatively unobstructed as they made their way to the bookstore. Jem had left his pencil case here, apparently, and as a stickler for all things hand-written and personal, would not be deterred from retrieving his extravagant collection of pens.

Will had tried to tell him to cut his losses, but if James Carstairs had only one quality to his name, it would be stubbornness.

 _My aunt gifted these to me before I left_ , he’d explained. _They have sentimental value, they’re expensive, and I need them. I’m going back for them._

And where Jem went, Will tagged along.

Probably it was best he hadn’t gone inside. He hadn’t worked at the bookstore in years, and yet this was a sort of home for him—the closest to home he’d known that was not in the shape of black-brown eyes and quirkily crooked teeth. His current job paid more, but Will could not deny that what he’d gotten from this store had been more than cash. He’d built up a neat fort of books and barbed wire around himself, both as a protection for himself and the world. The only person to have painlessly made it over the top had a series of metal shards lodged in his spine, with the potential for death looming above his head like a rather depressing cloud.

Jem walked out onto to street, pencil case clutched in his hands, and Will knew there was no one he’d rather share his solitude with.

 _And when there’s a bullet between his eyes as payment for your company?_ asked a treacherous voice in his head, sounding too much like his own to be comfortable.

Will stepped around those thoughts, throwing his arm around Jem’s shoulder as they made their way back to their flat.

“Will, do you hear that?”

They stopped, perfectly in tune with one another’s movements, listening carefully. There, just down the street—the sound of pounding footsteps. Will got out his keys from his pocket, slotting one between his now-clenched fingers. Jem pulled out a few uncapped pens. In his defence, they were quite sharp.

“At least we’ll go down as the idiots that brought keys and pens to a gun fight.”

“It could be a dog.”

Wholly distracted, Will turned to his friend with wide eyes. “What dog sounds like _that?”_

“Will—!”

Looking away had been the wrong choice.

There was a solid mass colliding into him, decidedly _not_ a dog, and Will’s keys were skittering across the pavement with a sad grating noise.

Eyes the colour of that very pavement looked down at him, a forearm at his throat. “Are you going to hurt me?”

Bewildered at the girl on top of him, Will said, “I beg your pardon.”

“ _Are you going to hurt me?”_

Jem shrugged helplessly, clearly shaken up by the frayed look in his eyes. Will spluttered around his response. “No? No—I’m not going to hurt you. Neither of us is.”

Seemingly satisfied with the response she’d gotten, the girl collapsed onto his chest, forehead knocking against his chin with an awful noise.

“ _Ow!”_

“I think we should go to the hospital.”

Will glared a fantastic glare up at his friend, who was now back to his unflappably calm ways. “No, I was thinking of laying here all night. She’s not a nuisance to stay under at all.”

Jem hummed good-naturedly. “You’re right. She doesn’t look all that heavy.”

With that, he walked away.

“Jem?”

Nothing.

“Jem!”

Only retreating footsteps.

“JAMES CARSTAIRS, YOU DISLOYAL BASTARD!”

A full-bodied laugh this time. Jem circled back and gently eased the unconscious girl off Will’s chest. “That was worth it.”

“I hope your pens bleed all over your laptop,” Will spat, only lightly winded from the weight. 

“Less threatening, more calling an ambulance.”

Will dialed _999_ with a fury.


	2. Flatline in the Soul

Lights burned her eyes. Metal bit into her skin. There was beeping and there was terror and there was _pain_ —

Tessa choked around her next breath, rushing back to reality, to present, to _now_. And in that now, there were two distinct gazes pinned on her.

She threw her hand out to her left, hand clasping around the landline and brandishing the corded phone like a weapon. The bouncing cord somewhat diminished the effect she’d been going for, as did the ceaseless pounding in her skull, but she remained firm in her intimidating façade. Her teeth were clenched to the point of throbbing, and she blinked away the spots on her visions that had just too much shape.

“Does she know that’s a phone? I think the British oxygen might be doing things to her brain.” A beat passed in aching silence. “I’m going to tell her it’s a phone.”

“Pipe down, Will.”

Their speech was affected— _accented_ , she reminded herself. Accented—because she was in London. She’d moved to London on a scholarship. She was to move in with her brother in two days’ time.

And then she’d plowed over a man on the street. Judging by the infuriating lilt in the voice across from her, the very same man was with her now.

She adjusted her legs under her, waving the phone back and forth as if there was a threat.

The one with the wild hair turned to the other. “Is this the thanks we get for saving her from peril?”

“Is that what we did?” asked the man with the soft voice. “The doctor said she was just sleep-deprived. Even so, she overpowered you without so much as a thought.”

The wild-haired one clicked his tongue. “We need to go over what it means to be a _friend_ , James.”

“Only if you’re the one teaching me, _William_.” Probably-James faced her then, friendly agitation melting away as soon as their eyes met. “You must be confused. I’m sorry if our banter is only worsening your headache. I’m Jem Carstairs. The reprobate to my right is Will Herondale.”

Will grinned. Tessa had to blink her eyes all over again to understand that it was an empty, useless smile. “Would you believe me if I said that was the nicest thing he’s ever said to me?”

Tessa pinched her lips between her teeth. The one on the left—Jem. He was being perfectly candid. There was honesty written into the arch of his brow and the bend of his smile. The other one—this _Will_. He gave Tessa an awful headache. His was a cruel, underhanded honesty, playing across his face in sweeps and smirks.

“I think we’re—oh, how is it the Americans put it. _Freaking her out._ ”

“It’s another country, Will, not another time period.”

With a great trepidation, Tessa set the phone back onto the receiver without taking her eyes off the knock-off Odd Couple in front of her.

“Are you two going to kill me?”

Shocked eyes, raised brows, twitching noses—genuine shock.

“You are . . . _very_ concerned with our bringing harm to you, Ms., um . . .”

“Gray,” Tessa said. “Theresa Gray. Just—Tessa. Tessa is fine.”

Will’s eyes, the colour of a pristine bottomless well, dimmed. “Are you certain we haven’t knocked anything loose in that head of yours?”

“What he means to say,” Jem corrected, “is that we’re concerned you may have suffered more from any damage to your head than the loss of consciousness. Seeing as we’re not family or friend to you, we were able to glean very little from your doctor. Has she told you anything?”

“I woke up when you two were here.” Self-consciously, she pulled the rough hospital bed sheets up closer to her collarbones. “While we’re on the subject: How long have you two _been here?”_

“Well,” Will lilted, “you caught us on a rather uneventful Friday night. Some boys our age will get knackered, but no. _We_ are boring. Thus, we are here, checking up on the girl who made our night interesting.”

“I’d hardly call us boring.”

“We’re friends with _Henry_ , Jem. Compared to him everyone is boring.”

Tessa did not know who Henry was, but the harrowed look in Jem’s eyes as he nodded told her more than she wanted to know.

“You two brought me here,” she realized aloud.

“That was the ambulance. We’re strong, Ms. Gray,” Will said hollowly, “but we certainly weren’t going to haul you all the way to the hospital.”

Feeling her patience fraying, Tessa turned to Jem. “If I thank him, is he going to spit in my eye?”

Jem smiled at her, bright and welcoming. She instantly relaxed, allowing her hand to drop from its place at her chest. “He’s terrible,” Jem conceded, “but he’s not _that_ terrible.”

“You underestimate me, James.”

Tessa righted her posture, staring them both down for a brief moment—but it was enough to grant her an extra bout of courage. “Thank you. Both of you. My experience in London so far has been—a confusing one. It’s good to know that there are people like you around.”

“And what are people like us, Ms. Gray?”

This time it was Tessa’s turn to smile. “Reprobates and their babysitters.”

Jem turned away, coughing violently into his hand with too obvious a smile. Will wasn’t faring much better, spluttering around shocked laughter that lit up his eyes, a full moon tossing its scattered light across a roiling ocean’s surface.

“Well, then, Ms. Gray.” Will fiddled with the rolled-up sleeves of his button down. Tessa had a run-away thought that perhaps all British college students dressed liked this—but then she was looking at Jem’s sweater, worn where he must have poked his thumbs into the wrists, and told herself Will’s fashion may just be a by-product of his . . . _everything else_. “I think this is where we see ourselves out.”

There was something else he wanted to say. Tessa saw it, knew it, wanted to comment on it. A pulsing ache in her temples gave her pause.

“Will we be seeing you around?”

“I’m transferring for my second year at King’s,” she told them.

Will nodded slowly, as if the information had been a lot to digest. “Ah, so you’re our age.”

“I’m eighteen,” she said. “I think you two are nineteen.”

Jem’s brows leapt. “Good guess. But how’d you make it?”

“I started school a year early back home,” she clarified. “So I’m just. Younger.”

Will was now enraptured with the state of his cuticles. “What’s your major?”

Tessa fidgeted. “Literature. English Literature.”

Will cussed as he dug his nails too hard into the soft bed beneath them. Jem glanced at him sidelong, curious. “Well you’ll be seeing a lot of him,” he said. “A little of me.”

“You’re English majors?”

Will was still staring at his nails, leaving Tessa clueless as to the thoughts running through his head.

“He is,” Jem told her, nodding his head at his companion. “I’m heading more in the music direction.”

“He could have been headed to Hong Kong,” Will muttered.

Tessa got her first glimpse of what Jem might look like when he was annoyed. “Will, we discussed this.”

Sensing tension where she did not want it, she offered them both a kind smile. “Thank you for getting me here,” she said, careful of her wording so as not to set off Will once more. “And I . . . will see you two around?”

“Classes start in two days, right? There’s a bookstore on Belvedere; why don’t you meet us there, and we’ll keep you company for the day?”

Will let out a long-suffering sigh. “Your charity knows no bounds, Jem.”

He walked out of the room after that, heading down the hall until Tessa couldn’t hear his retreat. Jem shook his head sadly. “Ignore him. You’re not charity.”

And he was not lying.

These two were interesting, she decided; they were entirely incompatible, yet they seemed to work in tandem. Where Will Herondale pushed, Jem Carstairs pulled; where Will hissed venom, Jem soothed. It left Tessa wondering just how they’d come to tolerate one another, let alone become so close.

“My offer stands, Tessa. And, despite Will’s display of huffing and puffing, he won’t shun you if you come.”

“Are you sure?” Tessa asked, uncertain. “I think he’s thinking of the best time to shove me into oncoming traffic.”

Jem’s smile was back, and though she did not think it was a rare occurrence, there was a strange sense of pride she got from making it happen. “Then we’ll be right back here in two days, won’t we?”

She was about to respond when she saw a man with a black messenger back approach the desk outside her room. On the bag was _S.I.S._ stitched in bone-white.

Tessa heard her heartrate pick up on the monitor behind her. Jem noticed as well, giving an accusatory glare to the man with the bag. Swiftly he shut the door, peering into Tessa’s eyes in the hopes of seeing . . . something. She couldn’t focus on him for the moment.

“Are you all right?”

No, not even a little. Her bones hummed in painful recollection; her veins burned as she tried to combat the memories lurking beneath the surface of her consciousness.

_You are faulty, Theresa Gray, but you are still a cog in our machine. You still have your usefulness._

The monitor’s beeping picked up in speed. Her teeth throbbed. She shuddered.

“Tessa?’

Jem’s voice was a calming splash of water on her face. “Is he still there? The—the man with the bag?”

Jem obediently opened the door, just enough to peek his head out. Leaning back inside the room, he said, “He’s gone. But, Tessa, how do you—?”

“Thank you for your time, Jem, but if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, I’d like to rest.”

The lines of Jem’s mouth were severe, but he acquiesced. Before he turned to leave, however, he walked over to the table with the phone and took up the pen. He scribbled something down, giving her a shaky smile as he departed. Tessa plucked the sheet of notepad paper and read the note left for her.

_Below are my and Will’s numbers. Yes, Will’s. He’ll answer your call  
if you truly need his help. Be safe, Tessa Gray, because I would rather  
like to see how you hold up with the infamous William Herondale  
as one of your classmates._

Tessa could not see honesty in handwriting, but she liked to think that he was being honest anyway.

The monitor’s beeping slowed.

Those letters had burned themselves on the inside of her eyelids.

_S.I.S. . . ._

Tessa brought a hand up to her necklace, the only keepsake of her mother's that had been recovered from the explosion, and was glad for its ticking. But she did not feel better at all. 

As her pulse pounded in her throat and fingers, she feared she never would.

-

“Will. Will! _William!”_

“It’s not fun, is it, bring ignored?”

Well-versed in Will’s antics as he was, Jem did not bother with getting annoyed. “Will, slow down.”

Automatically Will stopped walking, carefully watching Jem as he approached. Jem grabbed his friend by the elbow, winding around corners and through hallways before he was satisfied with their seclusion. The sight of the man at the desk had rattled him—had rattled Tessa as well, though Jem could not think of why.

“One of them is here.”

Jem often found himself musing over the fact that Will was a reflection of his soul, darker in some places and lighter in others. He was back to those musings for a brief moment as he saw the recognition on Will’s face, despite only being given a select few words. Being understood so easily was one of his life’s blessings. “No. It can’t be.”

Jem had a response ready, but there was a white-hot flare of pain shooting up his spine. He closed his throat around the cry of pain he wanted to let out, and it was that effort that had been careening forward into Will’s chest.

He was tried. He’d been standing for too long. His body was reminding him that, though he had invaluable things in his life—namely one Will Herondale—normalcy was not a luxury he had.

“Jem, did you take your painkillers?”

“They make me tired,” he said through clenched teeth, for the millionth time.

Another flare blotted out his vision, this time strong enough to make Jem groan into the collar of Will’s shirt.

“ _Jem_ —”

“Will,” he huffed. “No.”

Will sighed, the sound ragged and old and fond, bringing a hand up to slot his fingers through Jem’s hair. “Where’s your cane?”

“Bookstore.”

Will nodded, though he did not move away. “Can I convince you to take a wheelchair there?”

It was not a question of being convinced, only if Jem was going to agree with Will’s acquiring of a wheelchair. “Fine. But how are you going to get one?”

Will’s grin was perfectly mischievous. Jem was always a little too weak for it for his own good. “You let me worry about that. But you’re going to have to cover for me while I get one.”

“Oh, Will, all I’ve been doing since the day we met is covering for you.”

Will’s eyes glinted like a cheap diamond ring. “What a shitty deal you’ve stricken.”

Jem straightened at that, taking Will’s arm as they made their way to the lift. “I think it’s one of my best.”

He did not imagine Will leaning closer.

As they waited for the lift, Will craned his neck behind them.

He swallowed too roughly for Jem’s comfort. Feeling his gut twisted in fear, he turned to face whatever had caused Will such stress—

And saw the very same man from before staring at them.

“I’ll kill them all one day.”

Jem shook his head, even as his back flared in a phantom pain. His parents’ screams and cries were written into the marrow of his bones, but he could not allow himself to fall victim to the anger that lived in him because of it. If he did, he would only fuel Will’s fire, and Will already burned brightly enough for the both of them. “Let’s just leave.”

“I said one day,” Will murmured as the doors opened. “Today is not that day, sadly.”

Jem had hoped to leave this all behind him when the police had broken into that subbasement in Shanghai, but it seemed he would not be so lucky. These people were going to follow him, and they were going to follow Will.

He thought of Tessa, panic etched into her elegant features, and wondered if they were following her as well.

The doors closed before he could think much of it.


	3. Hope in the Darkness

When morning came, it was with light slanting through aged blinds and the cottony lull of slumber filling her mind. Between one blink and the next, she thought she may have been back home—that she would look to her right and see the book she’d _nearly_ finished reading before her aunt told her to stop piling onto the energy bill.

But then there was beeping, the quieted chatter of nurses, and the ticking of her small metallic angel. Desperate for a tether, Tessa traced her fingers along the shape of that angel—the folded wings, the billowing robes, the small _S_ and _O_ carved into the bottoms of its feet.

 _Your mother was always telling me to walk my own path._ Seek opportunity. _It was practically her catchphrase. I just hope she was happy with all she sought before the accident._

Tessa couldn’t remember the explosion that had occurred in her childhood home. Apparently no one else had been hurt, but her parents had not made it out alive. She was not big on prayer, but she got close to it whenever she hoped with all her heart that their deaths had been swift and as painless as they could be.

Her dream was slowly slipping away from her grasp, but she swore she remembered a looming series of spires, like those of a church, as well as a fireplace and small orbs of light.

But it was just a dream, likely the product of all the literature she’d consumed as a child. Great castles, grand weapons, heart-pounding romance.

With a groan, she recalled her little display with the phone and the two boys. Jem and Will, one made up of the beautiful arcs of a deft painter’s hand, the other crafted from marble and a strong image.

“I had two perfectly hot boys in my room,” she grouched, “and I’ve only just now realized all I could have done with that. _Great._ ”

“You have years ahead of you to make a move, Ms. Gray.”

Tessa yelped, scrambling to sit up in her bed. Her doctor stood there, lips quirked in amusement. _The British thrive on American humiliation_ , she decided.

“Those two boys who brought you in—they asked about you. I gave them the bare minimum, but Ms. Gray . . . You were in _very_ rough shape when you were admitted.”

The lights in that basement had hardly worked. The entire space had smelled of mildew. They’d told her to change, to shed her skin like a snake and dance for them. She had not known what they meant, and still didn’t. She’d seen the crystal-clear desire on their faces, but it was not for her; it was for what they thought her capable of accomplishing.

Her brother had promised to pick her up from the airport.

No one in that basement had known a Nathaniel Gray.

That’s where she had to go today—before classes started. She had to arrange her residences, her transit schedules—

“Whatever it is you’re thinking about, Ms. Gray, I must ask that you stop.” The doctor tapped the monitor with her pen. “You’re heartrate’s spiking. You need to reduce your stress if you wish for a speedier recovery.”

“What is it that’s wrong with me?” Tessa asked miserably, pressing her right hand to her head. _You can slither into any corner of the world, Ms. Gray, if only you_ try _._

She pressed harder in the vain hope that she’d push the voice right out of her head.

“Malnutrition, dehydration, overexertion. Were you preparing for a marathon?”

 _If you will not_ change _, then you will prove yourself useful in other ways. Until then, you will sit here, and you will_ think _._

“Yeah,” she huffed. “I wanted to go double the distance. Turns out I didn’t prep well enough.”

“That would be putting it lightly, my dear. You would have been six feet under before the finish line.”

 _Our perfect little lie detector. If you can’t become other people, I suppose it’ll do us just as well to have_ you _know_ them _better than they know themselves._

But that had not been the end. No, the end had yet to come for her.

She needed to find Nate. As the doctor rattled on, Tessa remembered one _damning_ fact: in her eagerness to meet her brother in London, she had not asked for his apartment number, or his location, or his phone number. _I’ll take care of it, Tessie_ , he’d said. _Just get over here! It’s been so long since I’ve seen you._

“When can I leave?”

She’d cut the doctor off, but panic had pulled the words from her throat. “Whenever you want,” the doctor said with trepidation. “You came in on Friday night, and it’s Sunday morning now. Even so, leaving is not my suggestion.”

Tessa had been forced to do what others asked of her for the past month or so. She was fed up with the concept. “Just give me the forms.”

-

She’d made a decision, two nights ago, the consequences of which she still had yet to face.

Her throat was dry, her lips chapped. She’d kept a close eye on those who waltzed into her room—her _cell_ , really—but they all wore masks. They never left too much of their faces for her viewing, her scrutiny.

Their caution had been their downfall; Tessa did not know why she had the gift she did, why she could tell someone’s white lies from their devastating truths, but she’d been forced to hone it here—she’d been forced to learn how to work past people’s defences, how to pull the information she sought like the loosened threads of a centuries-old dress.

She wished she could try the trick on herself. She wanted to ask herself so many questions. _Are you happy like this? Do you love what you see? Are you brave?_ But no one had ever given her a mirror, no matter how much she asked, and so she’d given up on asking herself anything at all—except one question.

_How am I going to get out of here?_

Tessa was not chained to anything in the room. The cot was lumpy but useable. The door was opened and closed to deliver her food—no slot in the door. She’d been allowed to keep her flip phone and her wallet, though she’d been given clothes by the people here upon her arrival. There was no visible camera, but she did not take that to mean that she was not always watched.

She was not a threat to them.

That oversight would be their downfall.

It was around the time they brought her lunch. She’d given up on her fear that they’d slipped something into her food; she was kept longer than she could have imagined, and she needed to make it out of here to see Nate.

The door opened.

A man walked inside.

Tessa slammed the door shut and leapt forth unevenly—but she tackled the man successfully, his nose cracking against the wall in his fall. Her ankle cried out from the strain, and her wrist was bent at an awkward angle, but—she’d done it. She quickly undid her belt, hands shaky and causing the buckle to rattle, wrapping it around the man’s neck just enough to press into his windpipe.

“Tell me the way out of here,” she said lowly. She stood, keeping a hand on the belt, and flipped him over. She ripped off his mask. The sight of his face was a comfort, even if it was contorted in loathing.

The letters on his chest glared up at her like a beacon. _S.I.S._ The people that had kept her here for the past month. She wasn’t sure as to the acronym’s meaning, but she did not care; she was getting out, and she was never going to let herself be taken into their clutches ever again.

“Tell me the way our,” she said again, “and _don’t lie_. You know it won’t matter.”

The man grinned up at her. It was alarming, the redness of his face contrasting with the gleaming white of his teeth.

This was going to get her nowhere.

She fumbled for his gun, keeping one hand on the belt around his neck. He saw what she was doing, and his fist messily collided with her skull. Tessa let herself go with the motion of it, leaping away with the now-freed gun—

And pressed the barrel into the very spot he’d hit her.

“Tell me the way out,” she hissed, “or I blow my brains out.”

“You young’uns ‘re dark things,” the guard spat. “We’ve ruined some ’a their lives. Broke their spirits. We don’t care ‘bout the little kids we leave weepin’ and bleedin’ on the road. But _you_. You’re different. You won’t.”

Tessa fiddled with something on the gun, praying to whomever was listening that it was the safety. The man blanched. She did not let her relief show. There was a wild, desperate beast inside her, coaxing her finger on to the trigger. Aunt Harriet had always told her to be steadfast, brave, but never in favour of ignoring her fears.

_If I die, it will be by my own hand. If I cry, it will be because I’ve caused myself hurt._

She did not need to see her face to know it was the truth.

“Tell me the way out.”

“They’ll find you, pretty bird. They’ll track your every move.”

But he told her. As he painted for her the picture of the halls and doors and windows, she stepped closer. Slowly, deliberately, until she could just . . .

She swiped the gun at his cheek, knocking him down onto the ground, it wasn’t enough to knock him out, but it was enough to disorient him, allowing Tessa to grab the belt once more and _pull_. The guard tried and failed to reach behind him, to strike her again, but then his hands were moving as if through molasses.

Then they did not move at all.

Her phone and wallet were in the corner of the room. She swiped them, threw open the door—

And she ran. She ran and ran and heaved air into her underused lungs, forced her thinning legs to carry her just _that much farther_.

But these people lived in the shadows. The chased after her, reaching their hands at her ankles. She would die before she let them grab her.

She tore out onto the lit street of quieter London, and she was so totally lost that she considered breaking down into tears, but there were two boys around her age close to one of the streetlamps up ahead. She made for them like there was fire at her heels, uncaring that she tackled the black-haired one without a thought.

He said he would not hurt her.

He wasn’t lying.

Tessa allowed herself to collapse.

-

“Technological advancement is a lie, and the human race is destined for crushing failure.”

In other words, Tessa’s phone was dead.

She stared down at the paper clutched in her hands, at the two names and beautiful handwriting printed on it, then at the perpetually black screen that seemed to perfectly mirror her soul.

Were payphones popular enough in England to find one with ease? Wasn’t there an entire show based around a phonebooth? But no, that wouldn’t matter; she had no change.

“Can I help you, miss?”

Tessa jumped, nearly dropping her useless lump of a phone, ready to scream bloody murder. She put on her most threatening face, but she was tired and sore.

A young man stood two feet from her, all dark hair and scathing green eyes. His was a long face, but it fit in well with the rest of his body, lean and angular.

“Um. Can I use your phone?”

“Lord help me,” he muttered, “an American.” He sighed, pulling his phone from his pocket. “Here.”

Tessa dialed Jem’s number, because despite what Jem said, there was no way _Will Herondale_ would be the person she went to for help.

Then his name popped up as a contact—or, rather, as “The Heathen’s Keeper.”

She looked up, chest lightening. “You know Jem Carstairs?”

The boy arched a brow. “You do?”

“We just met the other day,” she told him. “But—I don’t know a lot about the start of the school year here, and I don’t have”—no, she couldn’t say that—“the school’s full information, and my phone is dead—”

“If I take you to him, will you stop talking?”

Tessa nodded mutely.

“Fine. Let’s go.”

Tessa shook her head. Still mute. The man had been decent enough to have her follow through on his one request. And even if there was no danger spelled in the lines of his face, there was the human side of Tessa that wanted to be cautious. _Needed_ to be cautious.

_We’ve ruined some ’a their lives. Broke their spirits._

“Oh, for—you’re really not going to follow me? After _that_ whole show?”

“I’ve learned to not trust strange men who tell me they know the best places for me to go.”

She hadn’t meant to let her voice shake, but—it was there. She was still terrified, and she wanted to see a face that was even _half-_ familiar. She didn’t know where to start looking for Nate, but she knew she needed her phone charged, and to get off her feet.

The young man saw something in her that quelled his irritation. “Fine. I’ll call him here. Is that amendable to you?”

Again, Tessa nodded.

It wasn’t that long until she saw Jem’s well-kept head of black hair rounding the corner. During that time the brunette to her left would not stop huffing and sighing, but he kept close to her, likely to give off the illusion that they were a pair. Tessa appreciated that.

“Tessa? Is everything okay?”

“I. Um. Phone.” She held up said phone. “It needs charging. And I need to find my brother. And I need to find all my textbooks within the next twenty-four hours. And I need to get a bus pass. Do I need a bus pass? Jem do I need one of those clam cards?”

Jem smiled, supremely amused. “An Oyster card?”

Tessa felt the heat in her cheeks. “Maybe.”

The young man to her left looked at her like a parent would their wayward child. “Jem. _Who is this?”_

“This, Gabriel, is the best thing to happen to London in years.”

Shy and infinitely pleased, Tessa smiled. His tone was draped in truth, start to finish, eyes glittering in honesty.

Gabriel rolled his eyes. “Whatever you say, mate.”


	4. Snake in the Grass

“Oh, Sophie, _come on!”_

It was the second time in the span of two days that Will had been held at non-weapon-point. This time it was not a landline, but a frying pan.

“I moved out _last year_. Is this the way you’re going to treat this flat?” Sophie chucked the pan into the sink. “Lord above, what is _wrong_ with you lot. Where is Jem? He has a big enough brain to understand me.”

“He had to go out,” Will explained. “Why are you here again?”

Sophie’s glare was noteworthy, accenting her scar with its fury. “Charlotte needed her old economy textbook.”

The words fell from his lip on reflex. “Still trailing after Charlotte? I thought you two moved past that after secondary .”

Fuming and going a little red, Sophie stalked over to him, frying pan in her hand once more. “One day, Will Herondale, you are going to have to eat the _shit_ you leave behind.”

“Then let’s hope my prospective romances don’t mind a case of rancid breath.”

Sophie dug the rim of the frying pan into his chest. “You need someone here. Another roommate, maybe. This—this is getting ridiculous.”

“I thought you were going to tell me I need a wife to set me on the straight and narrow. Make an honest man out of me and all that.”

“No one is stupid enough to marry you.”

Will put a hand to his chest with a gasp. “Then I suppose I have to propose to the next person that walks in. You’ll see the error of your ways.”

“I hope the neighbours aren’t convinced a murder’s happened.”

“Why would they do that?”

“Because _surely_ whoever walks through the door is going to run away screaming.”

“Your lack of faith in me smarts, Ms. Collins.”

“You’re not a character in a novel. Stop talking like one.”

Despite himself, Will smiled as he turned away. He was glad to see Sophie standing up for herself against him, a lovely contrast to her silent spiting of him when they’d roomed together.

Then the door was unlocking and Tessa Gray was walking into the room, and Will’s smile froze uncomfortably on his face.

Jem, having held open the door, was offering him apologetic eyes.

“Herondale,” called the world’s most irritating voice, “I’ll have you know that Carstairs has just offered this woman a place to stay in your apartment.”

Panicking, Will let his first thought slip through his lips. “Tessa Gray, will you make me a reasonably happy man and—!”

Perhaps he would have finished the proposal, if Sophie Collins had not thwacked him with the frying pan. Will bent over the table, chest throbbing where Sophie had struck him.

Gabriel sighed. “Never mind. She’ll make the choice of not staying here out of self-preservation.”

Sophie, much too delicately for Will’s liking, set down the frying pan and made for Tessa. “You must be the girl Jem met the other day.”

Tessa smiled politely and a little awkwardly. Will pretended the twist of his heart was an effect of his frying pan-shaped bruise. “I’m glad they haven’t dubbed me anything worse.”

“Give it time,” Sophie soothed. “Will is going to find a way to offend you.”

“It’s a gift,” he wheezed.

Tessa gave him a worried look. “Are you all right?”

“Never been better. Sometimes a good hit to the chest is what I need to knock the demons loose.”

Jem helped him stand straight with a pat on his shoulder. “I hope you don’t mind,” he said, “but Tessa needs to get organized before classes start, and she doesn’t know anyone here.”

“I know my brother,” Tessa corrected. “I just don’t have his information.”

“Are we making things up now?” Will asked. “Because if we are, I have a secret bank account on the Cayman Islands that I’ve just chosen not to tap into. I like the poor man’s struggle of paying my own tuition.”

Gabriel muttered something about being surrounded by hooligans before heading out.

Sophie grabbed her coat from where it had been thrown over the back of the couch, looking to Jem with wariness in her eyes. “I have to get to my date with Gideon, but _please_ make Will clear the sink. He’s got decades ahead of him before he pulls the invalid card.” She opened the door after that, happily receiving a hug from Jem and a wave from Tessa.

“I’m an invalid of the emotional sort!” he said as the door closed. “Well. I hope she and Pastry Boy are perfectly unhappy together.”

Tessa blinked. “Pastry Boy?”

Jem took up his perch on the nearest corner of the couch. “Her boyfriend, Gideon. They met because he always ordered blueberry scones at the coffee shop where Sophie works. He never failed to ask for them warmed up, but we found out that was because he wanted an excuse to talk to her longer. _And_ that he actually hates scones. Then he ended up coming over a lot because—” He glanced at Will. “Family drama, if you will.”

“Good ol’ Gideon got the boot because he spoke out against his father’s support of a corrupt veteran’s foundation. The S.I.S.” Will turned around so his disgust wouldn’t show on his face. “You ever hear of them?”

“I’m . . . familiar.”

He hadn’t expected that. Turning around, Will caught the tail end of the pure hatred that had settled on Tessa’s face.

_Are you going to hurt me?_

He hadn’t thought too much about Tessa’s appearance when she’d come barrelling down the street, but he remembered the faint bruising on her cheek, the stale smell that clung to her clothes, the ragged look in her eyes.

“What do you know of them?”

Tessa stood straighter, mouth set into a line. “I just need to find a charger. I’ll be out of your hair in a bit.”

Jem frowned, distracting Will spectacularly with the way it brought definition to his brow and the concern-lit eyes that sat beneath it. “Tessa, do you _have_ a place to stay?”

Her hands tightened around her phone before she set it down on the coffee table. “I should have enough for a night’s stay at a motel.” She reached into her hoodie’s pocket, pulling out a wallet through which she rifled for a moment.

Will saw how empty it was.

“You don’t even have enough for a bus ride _to_ a motel,” he announced.

Tessa raised her eyes to meet his, indignant down to the twitch in her lip. “I hadn’t noticed.”

“Tessa,” Jem said, “stay here. We’ll help you look for your brother, see where he’s camped out at the moment. If you can’t find him, you can crash on our couch.”

“But my love,” Will said with an audible pout, “you’ve put _me_ on the couch for the night.”

Tessa’s eyes snapped wildly back and forth from Jem to Will, quiet in her confusion.

“The doghouse is perfectly warm this time of year,” Jem answered easily.

“Shunned, spurned, and scorned.” Will touched a hand to his heart. “How shall a bloke ever recover?”

Jem smiled, sharp and clever in the way that always had Will racing to catch his breath. “You’ve never had trouble finding someone to kiss you better.”

Will did not bother to correct him, wanting to refocus on Tessa’s jarring appearance in their apartment, but she was watching him all too closely, seeing something that Will himself wasn’t sure of.

“Are you sure your brother isn’t trying to ditch you?” he asked. “Seems like a rather long series of red flags for you to have no way to contact him.” He stalked over to Tessa, remembering himself enough to feel nervous about this new addition in his home. “And what’s to say this isn’t some elaborate story?”

“An elaborate story for _what?”_ She tightened her hands into fists for a breath before slackening them. “God, never mind. I’m heading over to the police station. I’ll see what they can help me with. Anything is better than _this_.”

She pivoted, heading for the door. Will felt his heart begin to relax, felt the little lights around it flicker out.

Then Jem was getting up to stop her leaving.

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Jem, let her go.”

There was always an opportunity for him to fume at Will; Jem was forced to clean up his mess, make things right in his name, translate his words for someone unaccustomed to his tongue of barbs and brimstone. Will prepared himself for it—braced against the threat that one day, Jem would throw his hands up, tired, and walk out the door, never to come back.

But Jem never so much as faced the door, only ever shook Will by the shoulders until the stupid was knocked loose, or until they could partake in the stupid together.

Even now, with Will causing trouble their impromptu houseguest, Jem gave him a patient look, asking for just a moment of patience so that he could fix the mess of _Will’s_ making.

“If you want to go to the police, we won’t stop you. In fact, I encourage it; there’s little else we can do in terms of finding him. But you need a place to crash, at least for the night.” Jem gestured at their apartment with a small, confident smile. “Quality over quantity, mind you—we’re still students.”

Tessa locked eyes with Will. “Is he going to stuff a pillow over my face while I sleep?”

“I like to keep people on their toes,” was all he said.

Jem hung his head. “No. No he will not.”

“Right.” Tessa picked up her phone from the table. “Regardless, I have to make a call. I will . . . be right back.”

“Please don’t think you have to,” Will called after her. He turned to Jem. “What in God’s name are you _doing?”_

“When we saw her, she was running like a bat out of hell. You don’t think there’s a reason?”

“Jem, that is _not our business._ ”

Jem shook his head. “At the very least, it’s mine.”

“How?” Will squawked. “Jem, we know _nothing_ about her, and you’ve offered her a spot in our home like that sort of kindness is a luxury we have. We’ve been careful the past few years. We can’t throw that away now.”

Jem pinched his lips between his teeth. In the soft afternoon light filtering in from the window, it was easy to see the certain corners of Jem that were more worn than the rest—those that did not come out of that basement in Shanghai completely okay. “What if she’s like us?”

“I highly doubt that,” Will said.

“Why don’t we ask her?”

He rubbed his hands down his face. “You’re hard-set on this, aren’t you?”

If Jem asked for his decrepit little heart, Will would scurry to the kitchen and make do with whatever knife he could find. But what if this girl was truly their downfall? What if she was the one to undo them after all the steps they’d taken to lead a relatively peaceful life?

_But this life was never meant to be a peaceful one for me, was it?_

Will sighed. “If you are willing to trust her,” he said slowly, “then I will trust her as well, because I trust you.” Forever and always, he would trust Jem.

“I would never bring harm to you. You know that, don’t you, William?”

Will’s heart lurched in a fantastic, painful leap. “I do, James. I do.”

But that did not mean they could not be hurt—not when their pasts were riddled with bullets and scars and screams.

Will could only hope that their futures were not mirrors of those pasts.


	5. At the Starting Line

Cursing Will Herondale to kingdom come, Tessa walked the length of the hallway until she saw the outlet.

And it was a wholly different set of holes than she was used to. Her flat prongs were no match for whatever plastic villainy sat above the chipped trim.

“Oh, you have _got_ to be kidding me.”

She looked around, clutching Jem’s charger in her hands and feeling herself near the point of breaking. Why were the outlets _shaped like that?_

There was the distant sound of a door opening, and Tessa was face-to-face with a shock of red hair. Or, as close as she could get to being face-to-face.

The man on the opposite side of the threshold was in a wheelchair, lost in his own world as he tapped away at his laptop. He was muttering under his breath, sticking out his tongue as he repeatedly hit backspace.

He did not seem to notice the sock on his head.

“ _Henry!”_

Sockhead—Henry?—did not look up. His tongue poked out further, his brow dipping in the centre like melting ice cream.

Maybe-Henry looked up, eyes locking onto her miserably flat prongs, and smiled warmly. “You’ll need an adapter for that.”

He was too kind to snap at, but Tessa was _just_ tired enough to consider to prospect. Before she could confidently make a decision, a small hand was plucking the sock off his head.

“ _Henry_ ,” said the voice that came with the hand, “do you really not look in the mirror before you leave?”

Henry didn’t appear bothered when he said, “They’re too high up for me, Charlotte.”

“Henry,” Charlotte said sadly, “we renovated the flat.”

Tessa peeked inside, saw that mirrors and tables were all sat exceptionally low, and worried for the distracted redhead before her. Henry looked at the same places, genuine bewilderment lifting his brows. “So we did.”

Charlotte placed her face in her hands. “Oh, Henry.” She peeked through her fingers, jumping out of her skin when she saw Tessa. “Oh! Hello. You are?”

“Someone from the west,” Henry supplied, going back to his laptop. “Charlotte, could you wheel me back inside? I’ll get her an adaptor.”

Tessa started. “Oh, no, please, it’s okay—”

“Just tell me where it is, Henry. I’ll get it.”

She saw Henry’s jaw twitch. “I’ll find it quicker. Just—pull me back, please.”

Charlotte did just that, and as Henry wheeled himself into the flat, she muttered to herself, “I told him we could have gone somewhere else. Why don’t he _listen?”_

All at once she seemed to remember Tessa’s presence, who was now standing there like a fool. “I’m sorry, miss. What brings you here?” Charlotte’s smile stiffened. “Please tell me you’ve not fallen into bed with Will Herondale.”

Tessa flushed. “Is that not something I should do?”

“Will . . . is a character. I adore him with my whole heart. But he is indelicate on good days, ruthless on bad ones.”

Eager to change the subject, Tessa answered the earlier question. “I’m starting my second year. Hence the accent and lack of proper technology.”

Charlotte smiled at that, crossing her arms. “You’re doing well. I hope you’ll find London to your taste. Though I can’t imagine why you’d choose to come to the one place on the map where the sun quite literally _does not shine_.” Her smile faltered. “That wasn’t very nice of me. Your choices are your own.”

“I haven’t gotten out much,” Tessa said tightly, remembering the faceless voices of her captors, “but I heard you get used to it. Eventually.”

“For your sake, I hope you have a great deal of patience, Ms. . . ?”

“Theresa Gray. You can just call me Tessa,” she offered.

Charlotte’s smile turned timid yet honest. “Tessa, then.”

Just as Henry reappeared, adapter clutched in his hands and glowing like the Holy Grail, a door down the hall swung open. When Tessa caught sight of Will, her pulse jumped; he looked unfairly beautiful in this shitty hallway lighting.

He looked to her. “Oh. You’re still here. I was hoping that was a nightmare.”

Tessa was infuriated. She couldn’t tell if he was lying, for there was deception limning the strange hue of his eyes, but the hitch of his lips was an honest one. Regardless, she deliberated jabbing the charger into her eye to spare her the experience of looking into that confusing face ever again.

“Will,” Charlotte sighed, “do try and control yourself.”

“Tell that to my rascal of a flatmate, who has offered _this_ wandering urchin a place in our home.”

 _Seriously?_ she thought. _An_ urchin _?_

“I distinctly recall Henry and I offering you and Jem a place in our home until you could get off your feet. Not that those feet took you very far,” Charlotte said, dipping in volume toward the end.

Will’s eyes flashed, but the light was gone the second Tessa blinked. “Jem likes it here.”

“Jem would dismantle a mountain if he thought it would make you happy. I don’t think he would have much cared if you moved.”

Will rolled his shoulders, just once. “Give him a little more credit. He has more free will than to follow me wherever I end up. You _know_ where he could have been by now.”

“And yet,” said a voice of lulling ocean tide, “where else would I have my fill of misadventure and impropriety? Certainly not in a quieter part of London. Though, to your credit, Will, you manage to make a mess no matter where you go.”

Tessa saw clear as day how much Will changed when Jem was near. It was as if he went from a lethal blade to a child’s plastic spoon. It was . . . rather endearing.

Jem peeked over Will’s shoulder. “Did you make your call?”

“Um, not yet,” she responded. “I didn’t realize I’d need an adapter.”

“You could have asked us for one,” Jem said at the same time Will murmured. “Clearly a sign you should _go home_.”

“What if we melted down synthetic wigs to make plexiglass?”

Charlotte placed her hands on Henry’s shoulders, the world’s stress settling onto her own. “That sounds promising, Henry. Will, I don’t know how you know her, but I do know you, and that means I know for a fact that you’ve caused this girl strife every second you’ve been in her company. _Stop it_. Jem, as for you, I can only hope that you’ll keep the very fabric of the sky from tearing when Will takes a knife to it.”

Will’s grin was sharper than any blade. “God, it’s like I never even left home.”

Charlotte did not waver. “You certainly didn’t leave _this_ home. Not really.”

Jem’s warmth permeated the hallway when he inclined his head in a grateful nod. “And we’ll always be in your debt for that, Charlotte. We owe you a great deal.”

Will was artfully silent. Henry was still considering the logistics of collecting enough synthetic wigs to supply a small industry, while Charlotte let a portion of the tension seep out from her shoulders. Tessa felt _very_ out of place. 

“Oh,” Charlotte said, as if startled, “will you two come over later today? There’s something we need to discuss.”

Will traced his fingers along the nails of his other hand. “You can’t just tell us now?”

“Are you busy tonight?”

“In case you’ve forgotten, the only reason I’m able to pay my share of the rent is because there are fucks on the internet with enough blood in their pricks to fork over their hard-earned cash in exchange for a little viewing of my gloriousness.”

It was not that hard to imagine as Will Herondale as a camboy, or some variant of it, but— “Why are you lying?”

Well, Tessa hadn’t meant to say that _at all_.

Henry was the only one to not stare at her incredulously, though she attributed that more to his lack of awareness than the absence of a reaction.

 _Shit, shit,_ shit _—how do I explain this?_

“How do you know what I lie about, Ms. Gray?”

“I—” _Quick!_ “I just didn’t believe you.”

Tessa once more debated the benefits of driving the charger into her eye.

Will’s eyes hardened. “I don’t lie.”

She had to bite down on her tongue to stop herself from calling him out on that too.

Jem chose that moment to intervene. “We’ll be taking Tessa to the station, soon. Something about looking for her brother.”

Henry looked up at that. “Why would you do that?”

“That’s what I said!” Will chirped. “She didn’t like me very much for it.”

Jem mouth bent into a natural smile as he said, “I think he meant _why the police_ , Will.”

“Same sentiment.”

“No. Not even a little.”

Henry looked to Tessa. “I can get you all the answers you need in half the time it takes you to get to the station, Tessa, if you’ll accept my help.”

Tessa remembered the last time she’d let herself accept someone’s help. By the airport, with the bustle of bags rolling on the ground and voices buzzing through the intercoms, had been a pair of elderly women with kind eyes and a gentle demeanour. They said they’d been housing Nate for the time he’d been in London, that he’d trusted them enough to fetch the sister he never shut up about.

Then they’d jammed a needle into the taxi driver’s neck that turned his veins purple, and they’d taken Tessa to the underground complex that would come to house her most haunting memories. They had sprained her wrists before she could claw her way out of the cab, onto the streets whipping by. There had been no escape then, and for Tessa, there would be no escape for another thirty days.

The two women had died in an explosion about three floors below where Tessa had been kept, and the murmur from the guards told her that it had been an experiment gone wrong. The entire room and been engulfed in flames.

Tessa was beginning to settle on the notion that every important occasion of her life was going to be punctuated by fire.

But Henry looked so . . . _earnest_. And Jem and Will seemed to trust him—but what did that mean? She’d hardly talked to them for a collective two hours. That wasn’t anything to build any sort of trust on.

And yet. “Um. Sure?”

Henry beamed. “Brilliant. If you’ll follow me inside.”

Charlotte’s face was torn between pride and disappointment. Tessa didn’t have the energy to ask why. Will and Jem followed them into Charlotte and Henry’s flat. Immediately Tessa was all too aware of their presence behind her, one the clever whip of a wind responding to the other’s wildfire call. Compared to them, she felt all too much like a miniscule drop of water.

She spotted two diplomas to the left of the TV. “You two are grad students?”

Charlotte was infinitely pleased to be questioned about her education. “Yes! I’m heading towards politics, whereas Henry is in engineering. He’s bloody brilliant, but—”

As if on cue, there was a crash, followed by an _“IT’S ALL RIGHT!”_

Charlotte sagged. “But he has _four left feet_.”

Tessa wore a sympathetic smile for the woman who seemed one wrong breath away from falling over. “I think that’s rather impressive, actually.”

Charlotte did not see the humour. “Certainly.”

Henry was back now, a much clunkier laptop in his hands now. Tessa was the only one to not appreciate the clunkiness or the effort it had clearly taken to retrieve.

“Henry,” Will whispered, “ _those are the big guns.”_

“If I am to track down a missing person,” Henry said primly, “then I need the ‘big guns,’ as you call them. Now! Tessa. Do tell me all you can about this brother of yours.”

“You can’t get him on his social media,” Tessa protested. “I’ve never known him to have any sort of account. Says they’re too _messy_.”

“Please,” Will scoffed. “That’s a load of shite.”

Tessa heard an edge to his accent that she’d never noticed before. Jem noticed her noticing. “He’s Welsh.”

Will cast a betrayed look in Jem’s direction. Jem took it in stride, and Tessa barely heard his quieted response. “William, you’re all right. There’s nothing wrong with her knowing that, okay?”

She didn’t hear Will’s response, but as she made a show of looking at the diplomas on the wall once more, she saw such a raw, terrified vulnerability glint in Will’s eyes that she genuinely busied her eyes elsewhere.

“Besides,” Jem said lightly, “it won’t be long before she sees a picture of the dragon on your ass.”

“I will have you know that that dragon is a money-maker in and of itself.”

“Found ‘im.”

Tessa blinked at Henry, bewildered. “How—?” She swallowed. “ _How?”_

“Well, my access to S.I.S is relatively unrestricted.” No one in the room gave a reaction to the casual mentioning of the people that had unequivocally ruined her life, and so Tessa decided she would withhold her questions for later. “From there you branch out, punch in a few lines of code—but you can’t go too quickly. It would be like hearing five rapid, loud noises. You would get up in a panic, knife out. If you heard five noises throughout the course of the day, you’re less likely to panic. Though, here, a day is more like five minutes—”

“Henry, my love. Speed it along?”

Henry bobbed his head, tapping away. “Right, right, sorry. He’s up in some luxury hotel east of here, but according to his withdrawals . . . he hasn’t been taking money from his account to pay the fee. An account that is . . .” His brows shot up. “Lord help me. I’m afraid I can only classify that as _bone-dry_.”

“What?” Tessa asked around her tightening throat. “No—he said he was interning at this prestigious company. He said he was fine.”

There was a hiss to her left. She saw Jem clench his teeth and reach a hand around his back. Will was out the door in a second. He re-entered the room with a cane whose head resembled a snarling dragon, made of burgundy wood and jade eyes. Jem clutched the dragon-shaped head with an urgency, steadying his breathing as a fire ignited in his eyes. Tessa’s own breathing caught at the sight, for she had not thought someone like Jem capable of such heat.

“What’s the address?” he asked around a huff.

Charlotte took a step forward. “Jem—”

“ _Where_ . . . is Tessa’s brother?” he asked again.

Henry rattled off the address without preamble. “What do you need it for?”

Will grinned, boyishly thrilled. “I do believe we’re about to pay him a visit.”


	6. Chapter 6

Jem was not all that fond of using his cane. It invited questions from people he did not know, and, despite its exquisite make, reminded him of everything from his younger years that he would never be able to get back. Whenever he and Will went out, it was always someplace they could easily sit down, or a place that demanded the least amount of physical strain. He had not needed those accommodations when he was younger—had been . . . something akin to _whole_ , back then.

But those were musings for shadow-swathed mornings and rain-soaked nights; they had no place in Jem’s heart when he was offering help to Tessa and trying to rein in Will.

His back was flaring up, and Jem did not have the energy to spite his cane. He thumbed the dragon-shaped head of it, feeling the familiar divots, the arches, the clever make.

He hoped he would not have to make use of it.

As Will hailed a cab, Tessa eyed the cane. “Is it a thing with you two, the dragons?”

Jem too looked to the dragon’s head of his cane, smiling at the coincidence of it all. “Sadly not. Wales and China just seem to be fond of them.”

A cab passed Will without so much as a pause—in fact, Jem thought that it _sped up_ at the sight of them.

“DON’T BE A COCK!” Will hollered. Tessa blinked rapidly, whether at his volume or his word choice, Jem couldn’t tell.

“I thought you were from Hong Kong,” Tessa conversationally.

Jem thumbed the grooves of the dragon’s brow. “Because of what Will said?”

Will stomped down the street, tossing his head about like a dog on the hunt for an ever-moving bone.

“Yes,” she said, eyeing Will warily, as she ought to.

Jem released his breath, heavier than he’d intended. “There was an opportunity presented to me, last year, to continue my studies in Hong Kong. It’s not where I’m from, no, but it’s . . . away from here, and that’s what Will wanted for me.”

Tessa’s nose bunched up. Jem was a little gone on her. “Is London that bad?”

“No,” Jem assured her. How to say this next bit . . . “You had your own run-in with S.I.S, didn’t you?”

As he’d expected, she bristled at the mention of them. “Does that matter?”

Will stalked to the other end of the street, muttering something in irritated Welsh. Jem really did like it when he spoke his mother tongue; it was always something fun for them to do, say something in their respective languages and try to guess the meaning. Sometimes they were spot-on. Other time they were, frankly, embarrassingly incorrect.

“You’ll soon find out, Tessa, that most good people in London have been screwed over by them.”

“Even you?”

Jem gripped his cane. “Especially me.” He locked his eyes onto Tessa’s. “But I had Will with me, so I talked about it with him, and I had Charlotte and Henry who made sure I had a place to get better. They all understood. They all helped me, even if Will will go to his deathbed saying that he’s the scum of the Earth.” He bent his head to look down the street. No cabs. “I want you to have that as well. Everyone deserves help when they need it.”

Tessa crossed her arms. “Even when they don’t want it?”

Jem thought of eyes coloured like an ocean under twilight and said, “ _Especially_ when they don’t want it.”

“What happened to you?”

Jem smiled despite the rocks that settled into his stomach. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

Tessa’s nose did _the thing_ again, and he considered limping in front of the car that sped down the street. _Cute._ “You’re a lot more like Will than you realize, I think.”

Jem laughed, his chest lightening. “I think you forget I’m a uni student, Tessa; my humour is about as pathetic as it gets.”

She looked away. “You’re not half-bad.”

He’d take what he could get.

Will started back toward them, just as Tessa found the courage to say, “They held me captive for a month. Said that I should be able to change. The night I ran into you was the night I’d had enough.”

When Will was next to them once more, Tessa eyed him warily. “Never mind. You don’t believe me.”

“If you told me that, with them, the sky was made up of purple hedgehogs, I would believe you.” Jem withheld a shudder at the severity of Will’s tone. “Why did they think you could change?”

Tessa jerked near-imperceptibly in shock. “Do you care for me all of a sudden?”

Whatever Jem had seen of the Will he loved was now hidden beneath the Will that he rest of the world knew; eyes a truer blue than any sapphire lost their shine, and Jem was once again left to wonder what star he would have to pluck from the sky to get them to glow again. “Lord, never mind.”

Ten minutes later they were all squeezing into the back of a cab, Will pressing himself as close to the door at his left as he could manage. Before Jem got in, he whispered into Tessa’s ear, “He cares about the whole world. He just never knows how to admit it.”

What Jem did not say was that William Herondale was too terrified of his own love to ever speak of it, and that Jem could hardly blame him for it.

As they cruised down the street, Jem said to Tessa, “I’ll make good on my promise and tell you when we’re at the hotel.”

Tessa slotted her fingers together, fiddling with her nails. “You don’t have to.”

“He most certainly does not.”

They both ignored Will. “To be honest,” Tessa said softly, “it felt good to say it. The truth. I . . . still can’t really believe it happened.”

Jem gave her an encouraging smile. “You’re being awfully brave about it.”

“You can’t see it, but there’s real terror inside me at being trapped in this tiny death coffin.”

Jem caught the cabbie’s expression souring.

“Not a fan of small spaces, Ms. Gray?”

Tessa barely acknowledged Will, but she did end up responding. “After spending my past month where I have, I think I’ll exclusively keep to rolling pastures and open skies.”

“You would love Wales.”

Jem’s heart leaped at the sincerity in his tone. _There's Will._ “I hope you won’t take her before you’ve taken me, William.”

Will sat up straighter. Jem did not need to _guess_ that he was blushing; he knew by the way Will’s fingers started drumming on his knee. “You’d choke on the fresh air, city boy.”

Jem beamed. “I hope you’ll resuscitate me, then. What a shame it would be to throw away all our years together because of my intolerance to nontoxic air.”

“If you wanted to kiss me, you could have just said.”

Tessa looked supremely confused. Jem supposed he and Will warranted that reaction. “Flustering him is the best way to calm him down,” he explained, “but it’s difficult to do that when the man in question has no dignity to speak of.”

“Sorry. Come back next year when the Self-Preservation Circus comes back into town.”

But Jem saw the small smile playing on Will’s lips, and he had to look away before he felt the urge to trace them with his own.

He had to sit with _that_ thought until they reached the hotel.

Really, whoever this brother was, he was living the life. The hotel was not so much tall and intimidating as it was vast and lush, impeccably trimmed hedges greeting them with a fresh grassy scent as they approached the front doors. Gold trim winked at them from its perch atop the pillars at the front, the very same metal tracing the stark lines of the revolving door. Marble floors rolled on before them, shimmering like ice and just as smooth.

“There’s no way someone is staying _here_ and not paying the fee.”

Jem had to agree.

“Maybe Henry was wrong?” Tessa suggested.

Both he and Will gave her a look, Will’s decidedly more antagonistic. “Unlikely,” he grouched. “Nay, impossible.”

“Henry is absentminded, but he is smarter than all of us combined,” Jem said. “If he’s learned something, it means the rest of us should catch up quickly.”

“Mainly because he’s likely leaving smoking tinder in his wake, but it’s all the same to us.”

The lobby only became more cavernous the further they walked to the lifts; the chandeliers were hung on a ceiling so high that they could have been small stars, and every breath they made seemed to echo right off the walls, twice as loud as before.

The lift was empty when its doors parted for them.

Perfect.

When they three were alone, Jem told his tale. “I spent a lot of my childhood in Shanghai. My father was formerly of the British navy, honourably discharged due to an accident that left his spine damaged. My mother was a retired Army doctor, with nerve damage in her hands from a surgery gone wrong. Neither of them could do their jobs anymore, so they settled in Shanghai with the hope of starting a family.

“Then the S.I.S came. They’re London-based, you’ll soon find out, and because my father was a military officer there, he was on their watchlist. They specialize in rehabilitating former officers and soldiers, slowly integrating them back into society. My father, according to them, needed that. He was asked to come back to London, my mother offered a residence as well. But then they had me, and they decided they would not go anywhere. They wanted to raise me in Shanghai. The S.I.S didn't push the matter, but they didn't leave us alone, either.

“My father was asked to complete some paperwork for them, interview some interesting persons who had found themselves in Shanghai. They paid well, and so my father kept it up. Then he was asked to put himself back in the line of fire, and he realized that it was hardly a rehabilitation program at all. He and my mother decided to dig deeper, all while trying to assure me that everything would be fine.

“They ended up hitting the wrong nerve within the S.I.S. In order to lure them out, I was kidnapped. My parents followed me right down into that dank hell hole.

“And then they had to watch as I was tortured.”

Tessa’s breath hitched. Will’s hands were shaking with how tightly they were gripping his arms.

“They mirrored my father’s wounds, shard for shard of shrapnel. My parents were made to watch. I blacked out too frequently to remember much of it, but their screams are my most vivid memory. Eventually, my aunt and uncle—that is, my mother’s sister and my father’s brother—came to break us out. I was the only one alive _to_ be broken out.

“You might wonder why I use this cane. Why I need it. I can’t properly function without it. The risk of removing the metal from my spine was too great, so they’re still there. They, as well as the memories, are the tokens I was gifted in my parents’ honour.”

“Does—” Tessa chewed on her lip.

Jem inclined his head. “Go ahead.”

“Does it not . . . _hurt?”_

They were getting close to their floor. “Sometimes, when I walk for too long. Sometimes not. I have pills if I well and truly need them.”

She blanched. “Jem, you didn’t have to—”

“They’ve taken enough from me, Tessa, don’t you think? I think I will choose to accompany my friend and the curious girl we’ve met because she needs our help.”

She stared at the floor then, considering her words. When her eyes met his, they were nearly glowing silver. “Thank you, then, Jem. For coming and for telling me.”

His smile was all too natural on his face. “No one should ever be made to feel like they’re alone. Even more so when they’re _not_ alone.”

He couldn’t stop his gaze from flitting over to Will, who was now clenching his teeth so tightly that Jem worried they’d fracture. He should say something, swat him on the arm or hook his chin over Will’s shoulder. Anything to make him less tense. It was going to kill him one day, and Jem was in no mood to live in a world without William Herondale.

But the doors opened then, ruining any chance Jem had at cheering Will up as the latter stalked right out of the elevator like there was fire at his heels.

Tessa stepped off with considerably more calm. “Is he alright?”

“I wish I could tell you, Tessa.”

Will pounded on the door, impatient as ever. “OI, LITTLE GRAY!”

Tessa held up a finger. “He’s older than me.”

He rolled his eyes before pounding on the door again. “OI, BIG GRAY.”

“Right,” Jem said, “because it worked so well the _first_ _time_.”

Will’s eyes turned keen and glassy, landing on Tessa. “Ms. Gray, I must say you look positively _ravishing_ when you're getting on my nerves."

Jem didn’t have time to caution him against whatever he was planning before Will pinned Tessa against the door.

Well.

“I realize that this isn’t helping your image of me,” Will whispered as he fidgeted with his coat cuffs, “but if you could refrain from striking for the next two minutes, I would greatly appreciate it.”

Will’s hands weren’t anywhere on Tessa—in fact, he wasn’t touching her anywhere. All of his attention was on the lock of the hotel room door and the small screwdriver he’d slid from his sleeve.

“You never said you learned how to pick electronic locks,” Jem whispered conversationally.

“What can I say,” Will drawled, dropping his head in a way that would look incriminating to the camera at their backs. “I’m a man of many talents.”

“Your two minutes are running out, Will.”

Will grinned, bright and true. “Any way I can bargain for more time, Ms. Gray?”

“I know you know my name.”

“Sure,” he said, “but you have to admit that ‘Ms. Gray’ has a little more _je ne sais quois._ ”

“Your French is abysmal.”

“You’re lucky you can understand my _English_.”

“It’s true,” Jem chimed in. “You should have heard his speech when we first met; all you could focus on was the accent.”

“You don’t see me harass you when _your_ accent comes out,” Will huffed, going ignored.

“It comes out when he’s not thinking,” Jem supplied pleasantly.

“Will? Thinking? Don’t be preposterous.”

Will pulled back just as the lock chirped and quickly hid away the tools he’d used. “I’ve known you for a collective ten hours, Ms. Gray, and I must say I’ve already grown tired of your company.”

“At least we’re on the same page.”

Jem rather liked these two together.

What he did not like was the gun that was pulled on them upon their entrance.


End file.
